My Lords, as legislators, all sorts of laws pass through our hands—the good, the bad and the ugly. All are consequential for our fellow citizens, but rarely does a Bill weigh as heavily as this one. Wherever we stand, this law change could have a seismic impact on social attitudes to life, illness a…
As part of the good food strategy and other ways to ensure that we have high standards of animal welfare and people eat healthy diets, we are also looking at what are called novel foods. But clearly, we have to ensure that they are properly produced and are a healthy alternative.
LordsOral Questions3 September 20252 contributions
The Government are committed to building sovereign AI capabilities spanning hardware, software and data, and they have established a sovereign AI unit. This is backed by up to £500 million. The unit will advance UK strategic interests through supporting promising companies. We recently published the…
A lot is going on. What is being considered is investment in companies, but things that have happened include the formation of a new AI computer infrastructure—Isambard-AI went live this summer. The AI Security Institute is determined to make sure that we have the ability to look at risks of future …
I know this is something that is close to my noble friend’s heart, and he has made those points to me several times. As I have said before, I am happy to take that as a Budget representation, but I am not going to speculate on the next Budget now.
My Lords, I will briefly go back to a subject I have raised several times with the Minister before—PPPs. I welcome pages 44 and 45 in the report, and I also share the interesting views expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer and look forward to the report that is coming. I am content to leave t…
My Lords, I join the House in wishing the Minister a very happy birthday and many more of them ahead. I too welcome yesterday’s Statement. We feel as if we are turning the corner and starting to take a longer view, which we have not had expressed by politicians for quite some time. It is true that t…
I would defer to my noble friend Lord Hanson, sitting next to me, who probably has a far greater grasp of whether that is a good thing to do. In a sense, I am not sure that that will help here, because the one thing that you must have to book a driving test is a provisional driving licence, and with…
My Lords, peace day falls at the start of the UN General Assembly high-level week, the annual gathering of world leaders to discuss matters of peace and security and, this year, to commemorate the UN’s 80th anniversary. Peace is the bedrock of the UN. As always, the United Kingdom will be at UNGA in…
I thank my noble friend for that question. He is absolutely right. One of the things that I have recently done is meet the new Secretary General of the UNA, who is actively involved in promoting the UN at all levels of community. I spoke about how we could reach out to all civil society groups to re…
My Lords, I welcome yesterday’s Statement. London is grinding to a halt while, hopefully, we are seeing the rest of the country improve its communications. The Mayor has recently made announcements about changes to the congestion charge. I know this is not my noble friend’s direct area of responsibi…
On the matter of new taxation, my noble friend will understand that it is above my pay grade and outside my department. However, we have worked closely with industry in this area. On the matter of pouches, there is already advice that parents should ensure, where children and infants are using them,…
The noble Lord makes an interesting point; if he will let me, I will take it as a representation for consideration in the fraud strategy. The Government are keen to look at any measure that will reduce the level of fraud, which currently accounts for 41% of all crime; that impacts on businesses, on …
Public services are of course central to the AI Opportunities Action Plan , which outlines how we will improve these services to drive growth. We have announced £42 million for three frontier AI exemplars, driving departments to use AI to boost productivity and citizen experience. We are adopting a …
I thank the noble Lord. It is in the Government’s interest to help here as much as we can. However, as the noble Lord will know, that is a parliamentary accountability, not a government one. The Parliamentary Digital Service has issued guidance for Members and their staff on the use of AI, which is …